100410- A joke

.....This post is in fact the one hundredth consecutive daily post on this blog. As it becomes increasingly difficult to come up with original ideas on demand, I've noticed that since the fifty day mark that I've been using more long stories and topical jokes. Attributable quotes would be next, I guess, followed by cribbing Bazooka Joe comics and Snapple lids. Of course, I'm even more embarrassed that I haven't used the past seven weeks to nail down these tricky daily anniversary commemorations. For instance, a one hundred year anniversary would be celebrated with a gift of platinum (I think), seventy-fifth with diamond, fiftieth with gold, etc. Of course, once you get below the fortieth (rubies), the traditional list and modern list become radically different. That's because the modern list is a shameless, obvious scam. The later anniversaries are all the same because they're already remembered with precious stones and metals. They're already expensive and besides that, fewer people reach those anniversaries. Between death and divorce, there are far more people reaching their fifth anniversary than their seventy-fifth. The so-called modern list is an attempt to move the more expensive materials to the more common earlier anniversaries: the second anniversary, cotton, becomes china (previously twentieth) on the modern list; the twentieth becomes platinum. Leather becomes crystal, fruit becomes appliances (ooooh, romantic), wood becomes silverware and in an oddly specific turn wool becomes desk sets. This sounds less like a way to renew the bonds in your life and more like a stranger's attempt to empty a crowded warehouse. I say we just skip the pretense and insist that all anniversaries be marked with the elements on the tail-end of the periodic table. Accept nothing with an atomic number less than one hundred. These are the sort of materials whose nuclei are so massive that they can only exist if they're synthesized in a laboratory, and even then they almost spontaneously tear themselves apart. What better way to say that our time together is precious than with something that can't even exist for more than a fraction of a second? And best of all, the process is so expensive it nearly guarantees bankruptcy for most young couples early on, eliminating the need to memorize the rest of these silly lists.

100409- A joke

.....I can't believe news outlets are ignoring genuine issues in order to squander airtime babbling about the new television ad from Nike with Tiger Woods. If you haven't seen it, the visuals are a single 30-second shot of Woods in an extremely slow zoom-in but the audio is a clip of his late father's voice taken from an interview. His father seems to be answering a question about what he would ask his son. The last thing we hear him say is, "have you learned anything?" and then the visuals cut to a white Nike symbol in the middle of a solid black background. I'll tell you what I've learned from all this: "Just Do It" is just as idiotic a lifestyle model as it is advice for buying shoes.

100408- A joke

.....Is someone who hates pseudo-pods lack-toes intolerant?

100407- A joke

.....Another cliche that really needs to be retired is, "A face that could stop a clock". It only makes sense for mechanical clocks that run on counterbalanced weights that can be thrown off by severe shocks. While it's possible that there are still specialist craftsmen somewhere in the world building purely wooden cuckoo clocks out of a loving sense of red-eyed spite, that's just not something that's common to most people's experience anymore. Not only are most clocks digital readouts, but even mechanical sweep-hand clocks run on electrical current. You can turn them upside and shake them and they don't lose time, let alone stop. Normally in these cases all you'd have to do is just exchange outdated technology for modern, relevant technology the way Bob Hope used to use the same jokes repeatedly for sixty years. Hope exploited the pathological laziness and bigotry of the entertainment industry and their propensity for pigeon-holing people according to physical appearance. Jokes about Billy Barty became jokes about Paul Williams became jokes about Gary Coleman. Jokes about Jane Mansfield became jokes about Marilyn Monroe became jokes about Ursula Andress became jokes about Dolly Parton became jokes about Pamela Anderson... He stopped writing new material in 1935.

.....Anyway, the problem with the "stop a clock" cliche is that most of the things that react to sudden violence yield positive results these days, and the cliche is intended to be an insult. Somehow, "You've got a face that could light a glow-stick" or "You've got a face that gets my remote to work" just doesn't have the same gravitas. You can't go too far in the other direction, either. "You've got a face that could snap a baby's vertebrae" goes wa-ay over the line beyond snide put-down. The whole point is to straddle the line between playfulness and condescension, which is more difficult than it sounds. That's the reason people continue using the same phrases even after they've become cliches and even after they've passed the point where their derivation makes any logical sense. It's just so hard to find a replacement. Until something better comes along, I suggest "You've got a face that Dick Cheney deserves."

100406- A joke

.....[I'm busy on another project and stuck for new ideas; here's a favorite story of mine that might actually be true. I've seen it repeated several times with slight changes in the specifics, which is the first sign of an urban legend, but I'm willing to bet that at some point someone else who read it would be motivated to actually carry it out. Enjoy.]

.....A young man checking out the newspaper classified section for used cars saw an ad that he had to read twice. It seemed like something was off or that he was not understanding it properly. The ad read, "Used Porsche, $5.00" and gave an address. That had to be a mistake or maybe a joke. The most likely explanation is that the decimal was in the wrong place and they wanted $500, not $5. But even if that was the case, and the car was a piece of junk, he might be able to sell the salvaged parts for more than that, and certainly for more than $5. And if it turned out to be a toy car or something along those lines, at least he would have a good story to tell his friends.

.....He rode his bicycle to the address, which was a well manicured home with a garage, and nervously approached the front door. Things looked a little too normal. Even as he rung the bell, he wondered if this was all just some prank being pulled on the resident of the house, and he was just the patsy who answered the ad. He was thinking of the best way to word an apology when the door opened and a pleasant-looking woman in her late forties asked, "Hello, can I help you?". The young man stammered, "Uhh... I, um, did you place an ad for a car?" The woman smiled, "Oh, yes, I did. Were you interested in buying it?" "Uhhr...yeah. Yeah, but, you see, the ad technically said-- I... I brought it with me here... somewhere... anyway, it said the car was $5. Now I don't know about legally what that--" She cut him off; "Yes, it's $5. Would you like to see it?" she asked. The young man was completely lost at this point. She didn't appear crazy. She certainly didn't look like a junkie desperate for cash or a thrill-killer luring naive bargain hunters to their doom. As long as he didn't sign anything or hand over any money, it seemed safe to go along with it all for the moment. "Well, yeah. Yeah, I'd like to see it.

.....The woman stepped out of the house, locked the door behind her and led the young man to the garage. She unlocked it, then pulled a remote out of her purse and opened the garage door. Inside, surrounded by the typical clutter many people have in their garages, was a red Porsche. It looked great, maybe a few years old. The tires seemed fine, the headlights intact, no visible rust or major scratches. Yet, the more that the young man saw of the car, the more he worried about what he must be missing. "The price does include the engine, doesn't it?" he asked. The woman laughed to herself. "Yes, of course. And I think there's a quarter tank of gas in it. You can take that, too. As is for $5. Why don't you drive it around?" she suggested. Try as he might, the young man couldn't think of a reason not to. "Sure. Let's go."

.....The seats squeaked slightly; the engine started readily and purred steadily. He eased down the driveway and past his bike on the lawn, turning down one street and then another. Once he knew that it turned left and right without incident, he tried the lights, the wipers and every standard feature he could think of. Since it was a residential street, the only thing he couldn't do was take it to maximum speed, but since (a) he didn't race cars for a living and (b) he opened the paper that morning expecting to get a ten-year-old Chevy, he wasn't too concerned about that. "Hell," he thought to himself, "if it turns out that the catch is a dead body in the trunk, I'll just dump it somewhere. For $5, there's too much right with this to care about what's wrong." He pulled back into the driveway and told the woman, "I'll take it. I can pay cash, right?" The woman chuckled. "Well, I sure don't take credit cards. Cash is fine. I'll go get the paperwork." Minutes later they were filling out everything needed to transfer ownership on the hood of the Porsche. He handed her a five dollar bill. "Thank you very much. Enjoy your new car." Once he had the keys, he grabbed his bike and nervously unlocked the trunk. No body. No room for the bike either. While he pondered whether to dismantle it or just leave it, he noticed the woman reentering the house. "Excuse me," he said, and put down the bike. After walking up to her door he said, "I'm sorry, but I just can't stand not knowing. I mean, I know I already paid for the car, I know we filled out all the paperwork and there's no going back and everything, but-- I just--" "You want to know why I sold the car for $5?" the woman asked. "Well, yeah I want to know why. I mean, whatever's wrong with it, it's gotta be worth more than that." "Oh, there isn't a thing wrong with it, as far as I know. In fact, my husband's 23-year-old secretary seemed to love it while he was seeing her behind my back. So when he ran off with her and left me a note to sell the house and car and send him all the money, I wanted to make sure it went to someone who would enjoy it as much as my mother's going to enjoy the house."

100405- A joke

.....After Easter there are always some lapsed Catholics who wonder why they only go to church three or four times a year. They weren't all traumatized by power-tripping clergy; some just drift away. For them, I think it's because the organization obsesses over its own hierarchy, which is needlessly elaborate and byzantine. For instance, non-Catholics are aware of major holidays like Christmas, Easter, All Saints Day, Ash Wednesday, etc., but they probably don't realize that every date on the calendar is a Catholic holiday of some kind or another. It's because there are more saints than there are days in a year. The Vatican just refuses to let go of any excuse for bureaucracy, plain and simple. Today is a perfect example: April 5th is St. Smedley Day, named for Smedley, the patron saint of comic-opera naval officers. Tomorrow is set aside for Ste. Ratchettatatata, Our Lady of Rotary Phones. Does anybody still pray to her? The last I heard, the abbess tending her shrine had been deaf for years. I say the Vatican should establish a hall of fame and retire inactive saints just to streamline the schedule. If you have any saints in mind that everyone else has forgotten and would like to see them step aside for more relevant saints, leave a note in the comments.

100404- A joke

.....You don't hear people complain too much about the commercialization of Easter the same way they complain about the commercialization of Christmas. It could be that Easter coincides with most people's spring cleaning and they're psychologically more prepared to divest themselves of material clutter and clear things out than to 'harvest' doo-dads at year's end. They devote less time to outdoor light displays when the nights get shorter and the sun's arc takes it higher. Then, there's the simple fact that most of the pop-culture trappings we associate with both holidays were clearly stolen from pagan rites and customs with the deliberate purpose of undermining what were then rival faiths. Knowing this, early state governments in this country banned most Christmas celebrations for years. No such outrage over Easter. Of course, when you think about it, exchanging traditional, historical imagery such as crucifixion (Sado-Masochism) and resurrection (necromancy) for purloined pagan fertility symbols like chocolate (opiates) and rabbits (sex addiction) might just be seen as an upgrade in some quarters.